Sunday, February 10, 2008

Free Exercise & Free Speech

There is never a dull or quiet day in DC, especially when there are so many places to demonstrate. I have seen people protesting in front of the White House, Chinese Embassy, World Bank, on the Mall, and more. However, today was the first time that I have seen people protest in front of the founding Church of Scientology at Dupont Circle.

I know that a lot of people think that Scientology is a cult that swindles money away from people and that it is banned in some European countries, but I am not sure how it kills. I would have asked the crowd but one of the protesters asked me if I was a handler- clearly indicating that I looked like 'the man' and that they did not trust me. Moreover, the protesters were dressed up as aliens or wore surgical masks, which made them seem as odd as the people they were protesting.

Thank you First Amendment.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

One of the big tenets of Scientology is its opposition to (I would say "conventional," but they say they're opposed to all) Psychology and Psychiatry. Most notably, they're deeply opposed to drugs like Prozac (and other anti-depressants) and Ritalin. One could easily imagine a world without the study of Psychology and Psychiatry, as I would posit that a reasonable amount of the population of the world might have committed suicide without having a prescription for Prozac or other SSRI anti-depressants. (Though this point is up for dispute.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientology_controversies

There have been a few cases where members of the Church of Scientology died or committed suicide, possibly because of the actions of the Church itself.

That's pretty much all I know. Hope this helps. :)

Kristina said...

This is why I love putting my thoughts into the blog-- because if I don't know something, someone will answer my questions :)